As has been the case throughout the summer, the Los Angeles Lakers are once again being positioned as this great enigma who are tough to project for the upcoming 2026-27 season. This time, it is the NBA General Managers who are contributing to that narrative.
The annual NBA GM Survey has come back around. The fun yearly tradition featured the question of which team's level of success was toughest to predict heading into this season. The Lakers were in the conversation, coming in tied for 3rd with the Utah Jazz, holding 13 percent of the vote.
This is a topic that can be interpreted in several different ways. Perhaps that is why the Lakers find themselves in this category. However, there should be a safe floor of what to expect out of Los Angeles this season, and there are more than enough reasons to believe in that being the case.
1 — Luka Doncic is the NBA's best floor raiser
You can only be so bad when Luka Doncic is the driving force of your team. That has been true ever since Doncic established himself as an All-NBA talent in his sophomore season. 2022-23 was the rare outlier campaign that featured his team missing the NBA Playoffs.
Apart from that, you know what to expect from a Luka-led basketball team. Doncic has replaced his old teammate LeBron James as the guy in the NBA who assures a team will be just fine as long as he is around. Why would that be any different for a Lakers team that has a solid supporting cast?
Doncic does not need otherworldly talent around him to win basketball games. The Slovenian superstar is the otherworldly talent. Luka has always made do and thinking that 2026-27 is going to be any different would be contrary to all the evidence he has provided over the years.
2 — JJ Redick has proven capable of maximizing his Lakers teams
JJ Redick is pretty good at while whole head coaching thing, too. Back-to-back 50-win seasons in his first two years as the bench boss would indicate as much.
In his rookie year as head coach, Redick navigated the chaos that was the Doncic trade about as well as a coach could be expected to. The Lakers evolved and adapted. The depth issues limited their ceiling, but that had little to do with JJ's ability.
Skip ahead to last season and you will find a coach that got everything to click for the Lakers ahead of when it was supposed to matter most. Los Angeles looked primed for a strong playoff run after Redick helped improve the defense, figured out the pecking order, and made Deandre Ayton just playable enough for the team to succeed. Unfortunate injuries undid that work.
Even with Doncic missing the playoffs altogether and Austin Reaves missing the majority of the first round, the Lakers upset the Houston Rockets in the postseason after being left for dead. That was more than many thought possible. Redick's coaching had a hand in that and should help Los Angeles enjoy another winning season once more in 2026-27.
3 — Walker Kessler will be the difference-maker Lakers are hoping for
There have only been glimpses so far, but Walker Kessler looked electric in his preseason debut. The new Lakers center quickly showed just how much he had been held back by the Utah Jazz.
Kessler gives the Lakers a defensive anchor that should be capable of letting all the aggressive perimeter defenders on the team thrive. He also gives Doncic the best-fitting center he has ever played with. Both of those points are going to matter.
NBA GMs even gave some consideration to Kessler as a breakout candidate for 2026-27. Whoever voted for him should be proven right in spades. His leaguewide reputation is about to go up significantly.
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